Howard Tiersky is the CEO and founder of FROM, The Digital Transformation Agency, that helps companies grow revenue across digital channels by supporting the customer journey and resonating with today's hyperconnected audience. He has a new book out called Winning Digital Customers: The antidote to irrelevance.

We talked about the three main themes in his book, which are understanding the customer, mapping the customer journey and design thinking, leadership and alignment.

One key takeaway for me is his notion that many customer journeys are emotional journeys. Howard talked about customer research he conducts with his clients, part of which includes interviewing customers about their experiences working with his clients.

He asks customers some form of this question, "What were you thinking during this experience/transaction/etc?" One of the most common responses from customers is, "I was thinking they (the company) don't care."

Wow.

Think about that.

It makes one wonder, "Do our customers think that about us?"

More about Howard:

* His book: winningdigitalcustomers.com

* His podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/winning-digital-customers/id1535975495

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiersky/

Kristi Faltorusso is the VP of Customer Success at ClientSuccess where she is helping to shape the direction of customer success. Kristi is also a founding member of Gain, Grow, and Retain, advisor to numerous organizations and software companies, plus a top 25 customer success influencer. Prior to all of this, Kristi built and ran customer success organizations at the director and VP levels at software companies like BetterCloud, Sisense, and BrightEdge. She is also starting her own firm, CS Real Simple.

Kristi recently published a blog post and some playbooks around the idea of up-leveling your customer relationships with something she calls a "Partnership Kick-Off Meeting." We talked about her partnership kick-off philosophy, the 3 steps to a creating a partner kick off, and the 5 elements of running a successful partnership kick-off meeting.

More about Kristi:

* Her Partnership Kick-Off Meeting Blog: https://www.clientsuccess.com/blog/so-long-onboarding-kickoff-its-all-about-the-partnership-from-now-on/

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristiserrano/

* CS Real Simple: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cs-real-simple/

This excellent Linkedin post from Ziv Peled, chief customer officer from AppsFlyer, shows a predictive relationship between NRR and future ARR. Specifically, the stat is 130% NRR predicts a 5X increase in ARR in 5 years when you add a 15% YoY growth in new bookings. The numbers Ziv also shared shows that NRR of 90% or even 100% related to single digital growth in ARR in 5 years.

I found this stat astounding.

Ziv posed a call to action that, as this stat reveals, increasing NRR should be a priority, and that the best way to increase NRR is to get all departments in our companies together on increasing NRR.

I don’t think bringing “all the departments together, and agree on the same goal - LONG TERM VALUE for your customers” is enough.

I believe companies should design a business model that prioritizes NRR growth so that “bringing all the departments together” as a unifying exercise is unnecessary. Because the business model itself prioritizes NRR.

Increasing NRR is function of business model innovation, not an alignment exercise.

Frank Zinghini is the CEO of  Applied Visions, a custom application development company that helps his customers build software applications. How do you persuade potential customers to buy software that hasn't yet been built and will not (or may not) deliver results for weeks or months or even years into the future?  And how do you do this, when each project is custom, and you have not way to say, "Here's what we did for this other customer," because the entire project is different?

By earning trust.

Easier said than done no doubt.

This is the challenge Frank Zinghini faces with each customer. It was a fascinating conversation about trust, relationships, partnerships, just plain being genuine about helping customers...even if that means talking customers out of buying from you.

More about Frank:

* His company, Applied Visions: AVI.com

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/frankzinghini/

Mark Harari is the best-selling author of Lobster on a Cheese Plate: How to Stand Out, Attract the Best Clients, and Win Every Sale That Comes Your Way. In his 20+ years in marketing, he’s won numerous awards for web design, video, copywriting, print advertising, and more.

So, what’s his specialty? Simple: generating leads.

We talked about his metaphor of a lobster on a cheese plate and his approach for helping the market see us as the obvious choice in our field. Our ideal customers should find us and say to themselves, "they are the obvious choice for me."

Do your customers say that about you?

More about Mark:

* The Book: https://bethelobster.com

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markharari

Shreesha Ramdas is SVP & GM at Medallia, which acquired the company he co-founded, Strikedeck, a leader in Customer Success Automation. Shreesha is a multi-time company co-founder including LeadFormix (acquired by CallidusCloud) and OutJoin.

We talked with Shreesha about what it means for a customer success organization to be outside in versus inside out in strategy and orientation, how easy it is to fall into the trap of being too one sided, and why you must balance these two and create a hybrid approach.

On July 29, 2021, Shreesha and I are running a Customer Success Leadership Network event on this topic, which you can register for on the CSLN website. If you like this conversation, go register for our event.

More about Shreesha:

* Medallia Strikedeck Website: https://strikedeck.com/

* Shreesha on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shreesharamdas/

* Strikedeck Radio: https://strikedeck.com/strikedeck-radio-customer-success-live/

Nick Amabile is the Owner and CEO of DAS42, a US consulting firm comprised of data analysts, scientists, business professionals, and engineers who provide end-to-end data services—including data strategy, tech stack integrations, application implementation, and enterprise analytics training. Nick’s FullStack Philosophy is centered around the two components critical to achieving data-driven success: building an effective data analytics environment and building a data-centric company culture.

We talked about helping customers become more data driven, the two components critical to achieving data-driven success, and the four maturity stages of a data driven organization.

More about Nick:

* His company DAS42: https://das42.com/

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/namabile/

Theresa Lina is the author of the bestseller, Be the Go-To: How to Own Your Competitive Market, Charge More, and Have Customers Love You for It. She is also a long-time Silicon Valley business strategist and practitioner who specializes in helping companies become differentiated, innovative, and more profitable market leaders. As founder and president of Lina Group, Inc., she has more than 25 years of strategy, technology, innovation, and marketing expertise.

Her origin story begins early in her career at Accenture when she moved into a marketing role and helped build a new line of business from zero to $800 million in less than a decade. That experience was the seed that became her Apollo Method, which she describes in her book.

If you want to be the "Go-to" in your marketing, listen to this episode and buy her book.

More about Theresa:

* Her website: Apollomethod.com

Anthony Blatner is a tech founder, ex-IBMer, and the founder of Speedwork Social, a top LinkedIn advertising agency. After watching a lot of companies with great products or services fail because of ineffective marketing, Anthony started Speedwork Social to help those businesses unlock their B2B marketing potential and achieve explosive growth.

He says everything we want to hear on Helping Sells Radio. We talked about:

* how marketing should lead with value not a conversion to a sale, though you do need a solid call-to-action

* what he thinks is the best form of educational content that works on Linkedin

* the minimum customer lifetime value you need to be successful on Linkedin.

More about Anthony:

* His company, Speedwork Social: https://speedworksocial.com/

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonyblatner/

David Duncan is a managing director at Innosight, where he works with leaders to create customer-centric teams, strategies, and organizations. David is a featured speaker and author on customer-centricity, innovation, and growth. He is the coauthor of two previous books, including the Wall Street Journal bestseller “Competing against luck: The story of innovation and customer choice, written with the late Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen. A leading authority on the theory and application of jobs to be done, David has extensive experience conducting market investigations around the world.

He just published a new book called, "The Secret lives of customers: A detective story about solving the mystery of customer behavior." As David says, imagine if everyone in your organization had the skill of being a market detective and empowered to have insightful and mutually rewarding conversations with the customers they serve. How great could your company be?

More about David:

* On Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidscduncan/

* The book website: https://marketdetective.com/

* His company Innosight: https://www.innosight.com/

Follow Bill:

* On Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/billcushard

* On Twitter: http://twitter.com/billcush